"The Mediterranean sea: Strong earthquake shakes Greece – thousands of race into the open"

A strong earthquake in the Ionian sea has shaken early Friday morning in Greece and a lot of people roused from sleep. The center of the quake was, according to measurements of different earthquakes to wait in the Region of the island of Zakynthos, and had a magnitude between 6.6 and 6.9. To feel the quake was in the whole of Greece as well as Malta, Albania and southern Italy and along the West coast of Turkey. Reports of injured, it was initially. A tidal wave call Greek seismologists was not lied to, so there is no reason to be a Tsunami of stock warning.

"It was a very strong quake," said the mayor of Zakynthos, Pavlos Kolokotsas, in the Greek broadcasting. "Serious damage but we're not. Also, information about injured, not available to me.“ The frightened people rushed to the Thousands on the streets and sought refuge in Parks. Many wanted to spend the night in their cars. The schools will remain closed on Friday and will be controlled by Structural engineers.

Local media reported that the quake had damaged parts of the port of Zakynthos. There are photos of a long crack along the port were shown to promenade. In addition, a monastery is said to have taken on the small island of Strofadi damage, such as the state television (ERT) reported.

"It was a strong quake in the Ionian sea," Ligobet said the geologist Efthymios Lekkas Greek-radio. The center of the quake was, therefore, about 44 kilometres to the West of Zakynthos, in a depth of about ten kilometers under the seabed. "There were several aftershocks," added Lekkas. According to the Deputy Governor of the Ionian Islands, Lefteris Notopoulos, after a first inspection of the police and the fire Department in Zakynthos is no information about injured.

inhabitants of Zakynthos reported that the electricity was down in large Parts of the island. "We are with our children now in the cars. The people are afraid. I see damage to the walls of the houses here," said an eye-witness to the Greek news channel "90,1".

The Region of the Ionian sea, is at risk of, latent of earthquakes. To the West of the island group, a deep ditch runs on the sea floor, where the European and the African tectonic plates meet. By the friction of the huge plates of strong quakes are becoming re-triggered.

In 1953, an earthquake of magnitude 7.2 shook the Region and cost nearly 500 lives. Almost all the towns of the Islands of Kefalonia and Zakynthos were razed to the ground.